Bristol County prosecutors appeal Aaron Hernandez gag order

FALL RIVER — Prosecutors argue that the gag order in the Aaron Hernandez murder case is so broad and “sweeping” that it violates their First Amendment rights of free speech.

“Without any evidence whatsoever of past misfeasance, or a reasonable likelihood of future problems premised on concrete facts, the trial judge’s draconian measures cannot be justified,” Assistant District Attorney Roger Michel wrote in an appeal filed March 12 with the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court.

Hernandez’s lawyers — who requested a gag order last November after they accused the Bristol County District Attorney’s Office and its “agents” of leaking prejudicial information to the news media — filed a motion opposing prosecutors’ request that the gag order be suspended — or stayed — while it is under appeal before a single justice of the SJC.

Herandnez’s defense team called the district attorney’s appeal “meritless” and accused prosecutors of trying to circumvent Garsh by filing the appeal with the SJC almost 30 days after the gag order was issued.

Meanwhile, Garsh denied prosecutors’ request that the gag order be stayed, meaning that it remains in effect, for now.

In her written decision, Garsh cited the intense public scrutiny surrounding the Hernandez case, which has generated millions of search results on Google. Hernandez, 24, the former Patriots star tight end, is charged with murder and firearm offenses connected to the June 2013 fatal shooting of Odin Lloyd in the North Attleborough Industrial Park.

“The extraordinary level of media attention to this case requires something more than what ‘ordinarily’ may be sufficient,” said Garsh, who also required Sutter’s office to train non lawyer employees on the rules that apply to prosecutors and defense attorneys.

“The realities of this case lead the court to conclude that it is not enough for the commonwealth merely to issue appropriate cautions to law enforcement personnel and others,” said Garsh, who also instructed the district attorney to investigate future internal disclosures that could violate the gag order.

In his appeal, Michel wrote that Garsh had imposed an “unprecedented array of complex, costly, and time-consuming” obligations on the district attorney’s office even though Hernandez’s lawyers did not provide solid evidence that prosecutors or police detectives assigned to the case had leaked prejudicial information to the press.

“Simply put, the gag order violates the First Amendment and must be vacated or modified,” Michel wrote.

In a interview last month on WADT-FM radio, Bristol County District Attorney C. Samuel Sutter said he had never seen an order like Garsh’s in more than 30 years of practicing in the criminal justice system.